What Might Have Been
by Rose Stetson
Summary: Spoiler Alert! Helen and John are dealing with Ashley's disappearance in their own ways. Will it be the final straw to split them apart or will it reunite them in a common purpose?
1. Nightmare

**What Might Have Been**

**Time: It takes place after episode 203 "Eulogy"**

"_Mummy!" Five-year-old Ashley cried as she stretched out her arms for the comfort that only a mother could provide._

"_Ashley!" Helen cried, trying to reach her daughter. The chasm which separated them from one another was deepening._

"_Mummy, please!" Ashley cried again. "I'm scared!"_

"_I'm coming, Ashley!" Helen cried as the wind whipped her hair into her face which distorted her view for a moment._

"_You brought our daughter on this dangerous safari?" John demanded from beside her. "Have you lost your mind?"_

_She tried to move the hair from her face. "John...She wandered out of the sanctuary..." She tried to defend. "It was not my fault!"_

"_A likely story, Helen." He said with a face that had hardened in coldness. "You always did try to hide your flaws so as to protect that facade of perfection which has always been your personal sanctuary."_

"_Mummy!" Ashley cried again._

"_John, I have to save her!" She cried, desperately._

"_Well, you can't!" He snapped as he flashed out of sight and over to their daughter. He caught her up into his arms before disappearing with her._

"_ASHLEY!" Helen cried to the heavens as she felt the bone-chilling cold of the torrential rain which began._

"ASHLEY!" She cried as she sat up in her Victorian-style four-poster bed, drenched in a cold sweat.

She heard the faint chiming of the Grandfather clock just outside her room, and realized it was four o'clock in the morning. She sighed as she got out of bed. Perhaps she should just get a start on her day. She still had so much to do. And though she knew it bewildered Will, she really didn't need much sleep to keep her strength up.


	2. What If?

The door to her study opened just a little after six, and she looked up to find John standing in the room. He had the look in his eye that she had come to recognize several decades ago as the strain of his conscience. He always had that look after he'd killed.

She inhaled and sighed. "Did you find her?"

"Find whom?"

"Dana."

He sighed. "Yes. I found her."

She swallowed. "I see."

"I'll go and find my accommodations." He said as he turned again.

"John." She whispered.

He turned. "Yes?"

"Do you...ever wonder what might have happened if we hadn't..."

"Hadn't what?"

"If we hadn't experimented with the source blood at Oxford?"

He inhaled for a moment. "Recently? Yes." He admitted.

"Do you regret it?" She asked, softly.

"The experiment?" He asked, eying her steadfastly.

"Anything..." She said, biting her lip somewhat nervously.

He inhaled for a moment before he took a step toward her. She tried to resist the urge to take a step backward. "Helen, there is a lot about my life that I would change if I had the chance to do it over again." He admitted with a heavy sigh. "And most of it has to do with you."

She felt his words tug at her heart strings, and she tried to shut her off from them. He had already hurt her more than any other man could even dream of hurting her. They'd lost a daughter – that was supposed to ruin relationships, not rekindle them. He was a self-professed murderer; she was a savior of the hunted. She couldn't allow him access to her heart.

He stepped toward her again, and she found herself backing up against her desk.

"Helen," he whispered as he caressed her cheek.

"John, don't." She begged as she felt the familiar burn of painful desire well up in her heart.

He stepped away, somewhat angrily. "You don't understand, Helen! I can't just sit around, and mourn her like the rest of you!"

"I'm not asking you to be something you're not," she returned, forcefully. "Still, killing her captors is hardly the most appropriate response."

"You are an exasperating woman, Helen!" He yelled. "Not even a week ago, you were willing to shoot someone who had requested sanctuary under your roof!"

"That was different!"

"Oh?" He demanded.

"I'm not proud of that moment!" She admitted with pain lining her features.

"Who are you to say that I am proud of my actions?" He asked with a small sigh as he reached for her liquor cabinet.

"Are you?" She whispered after a moment.

"Of course not!" He lashed out.

She winced as he turned back to her.

He sighed. "I'm sorry, Helen."

"For what?"

"My instinct has always been to protect. You know that."

"Yes." She admitted slowly. "But that was an instinct that had been morphed by the source blood."

"Oh, would you shut up about that bloody experiment?" He yelled at her. "What's done is done!"

She nodded. "Yes, it is, John. But imagine what might have happened if it hadn't."

He took another gulp of his liquor, knowing that she needed to get it off her chest, and that he was the only one who could really help her process it. "Tell me..." He finally mumbled.

"In the first place, you would not have become the Ripper." She said, softly.

He'd been expecting that, but it still hurt to remember the revulsion in her eyes when she'd first discovered his connection to the Ripper killings.

She bit her lip. "You and I would have been married in Christ Church Cathedral, as we'd planned."

He looked at the bottom of his half-empty glass before he swallowed the rest in a single gulp.

"Ashley wouldn't be the bridge between the twentieth and twenty-first centuries that she is today." She said with a faint smile.

The look of supreme anguish that settled on his features when he realized that she'd spoken in the present tense made her close her eyes in her own pain. "That she...was..." She corrected as she steeled herself against the tears which begged to be shed.

The tears came anyway, but she was able to bite back the sob which trapped itself as a lump in her throat. "She would have been miserable in the 19th Century." She whispered as she looked out the window in her study.

"You would have been miserable with that life too, Helen." He said, softly.

She looked at him with sad eyes. "I wouldn't have been miserable, John. Uncomfortable, perhaps, but you understood me almost better than my father understood me. You would never have refused me my work."

"The work that the Cabal tried to steal from you." He said with a bitter swallow.

"The work for which our daughter gave her life." She reminded, gently.

He was fighting his own tears, she realized as he turned his head.

"John..." She whispered as she took a cautious step toward him.

"Don't, Helen." He whispered, vulnerably.

She took another step, cursing her inability to watch another creature suffer as she saw him suffer. "John..."

He turned his tear-stained cheeks to her after a moment. "She was my salvation, Helen."

She was fighting tears of her own as she nodded. "I know, John."

She hesitated before she wrapped her arms around him, trying to comfort him as they cried over their lost daughter together.

When the tears had dried, she looked into his eyes. She bit the inside of her cheek as she felt the feelings from all those lifetimes ago come back.

"Helen," he whispered, gently.

She swallowed as she felt her heart begin to race. "You do the strangest things to me, John."

"You're my healer, Helen." He whispered as he leaned in and kissed her.

She didn't resist the kiss before she finally pulled away from him. She swallowed. "John..."

"It won't happen again, Helen." He said, pulling away from her. "I'll be on my way."

She bit her lip as she watched him leave. There were so many reasons why she should not run after him. Her head screamed that wanting him was wrong.

But her heart screamed that letting him leave was equally wrong.

She sighed as she sat down at her desk. She would never get any work done with this on her mind.

"Did I just see Druitt leave?" Will said, looking behind him.

"Yes." She said with a heavy sigh.

He looked over at her. "Hey, you okay?"

"I am fine, Will." She assured.

"You just look like you've been cry..."

"Will, I said that I was fine." She interrupted, looking over at him.

"Sorry, Magnus."

She rested her head in her hand before she looked up at him. "I'm sorry, Will. You didn't deserve that."

"No problem. As long as you're okay..."

She sighed. "I don't know if I am."

"Ashley? Or Druitt?"

She swallowed. "I...don't see how it's...any of your concern." She managed as she collected her wits.

"I figured that you might need to talk about it."

"I'm fine." She said, seriously.

"All right." He said, nodding.

"Was that all? Or did you have anything else to speak to me about?"

"Uh...I don't know...I can't remember."

"Well then, I suppose I should be getting back to my work." She said, looking back at her desk.

"Of course..." He said, nodding. "Sorry..."

"It's all right." She assured.

He turned to leave, and she inhaled. "Do you want to talk about something? I know these last few weeks have been hard on you too."

"I've been dealing with it. Trust me."

"I do." She assured. "And you're probably doing something a little more productive than drinking away your liver or killing your daughter's captors."

"So this is about Druitt."

She sighed. "He found Dana."

"And killed her, I'm assuming..."

She inhaled sharply before she nodded. "Yes."

He thought for a minute. "I suppose that's his default."

She sighed as she remembered all of the good times. "It wasn't always." She whispered as she looked down at the papers on her desk.

He tried to find something to say, but he was somewhat speechless.

Finally, she looked up. "Is that all?" She asked, knowing that she was on the verge of tears - a state she didn't want him to know about.

"Uh...yeah..."

"Then I can get back to my work?"

He nodded. "Yeah. Uh...let me know if you need anything..."

She nodded.

"Then, I'll...see you later." He said, motioning to the door before he walked out of it.

She inhaled as she sat down at her desk, resting her head in her hand as she began to allow the tears she'd been suppressing to slip down her cheeks.


	3. Druitt

"Druitt has locked himself in his room." Henry announced as he walked into Helen's office with a tablet in one hand.

"What?" She asked, looking over at him, curiously.

"Yeah...he won't talk to me, he doesn't like the Big Guy, and he barely tolerates Will." He said with a shrug of his shoulders. "Oh yeah, and Kate...she REALLY drives him crazy."

Helen's head snapped up at his wording, and he looked over at her. "I mean...bad choice of words." He grimaced.

"She aggravates him, then?"

He nodded. "Doesn't she aggravate everybody?"

Helen sighed. She wasn't ready to replace Ashley with some gun-for-hire who had worked for the Cabal. But the longer she allowed the bounty hunter to seek refuge within her walls, the more permanent her guest seemed to become. Even Henry's last statement had been more in jest than accusation.

"Has he tried to teleport?" Helen asked, cutting off her train of thought.

"No. The guy's nuts, but he's not suicidal."

Helen inhaled sharply, and Henry grimaced again. "And...with that, I'm going to get back to work before I can stick my foot any further into my mouth."

"That...is probably a good idea." She admitted as he turned to leave.

"So...what do you want us to do about Druitt again?"

"I'll visit him." She said, trying to steel herself for the encounter.

"You sure?"

She nodded. "Yes. It would seem that I'm the only one he respects here..." She said, managing to tease him slightly.

"Cute." Henry said somewhat sarcastically as he nodded and left the room. "Real...cute..."

Truth be told, she felt like she was the furthest thing from cute.


	4. Memories

Helen sighed as she approached John's quarters. She clutched the books in her hand as a security against whatever might happen in that room before she raised the other and knocked on the solid wooden door.

"Leave me alone."

"John, it's me, Helen." She announced.

A moment passed before the door opened. "What do you want?" He asked as he heaved a heavy sigh.

"I thought you might need or want to talk."

"About what?"

"Ashley, James, Nigel...anything, really." She said, looking at him seriously.

He sighed before he looked back at her. "Do you have any more brandy? I finished the last of my bottle."

She tried to bite back a disapproving response before she nodded. "I don't have it with me, but perhaps we can retire to my study and have a drink..."

He looked at his quarters before he shook his head. "No...I'd rather remain here."

"I can leave if you would like me to..."

He shook his head. "No. Please...come in."

A moment passed as she entered the room before showed him the books in her hands. "I brought something that I thought you might want to see."

"Oh?" He asked, looking at the worn cover of the first.

"Ashley's...photo album...scrapbook...whatever you want to call it..." She said as she inhaled slowly. "I thought that...as her father, you...might want to see it."

"Are you certain, Helen?" He asked, looking over at her somewhat vulnerably.

She inhaled before she nodded affirmatively. "Yes. Perhaps learning about her past will help you move on to the future."

"Is there anything that you would rather not talk about?" He asked, conscious of the fact that she was grieving their daughter as well.

She looked for a moment before she shook her head. "No. At this point...everything hurts, and talking about her...it's the only true pain reliever."

He nodded thoughtfully for a moment before he invited her to sit beside the fireplace. She sat down on the Victorian-era sofa which sat across from his wooden chair.

He looked down at the books which rested on his lap, and then he looked at her.

"Yes?" She asked, noticing his glance in her direction.

"When did you know?" He asked after a moment's hesitation.

"When did I know what?"

"About Ashley. When did you first know that you were going to be a mother?"

She inhaled sharply as the memories were stirred up once again.

-

"_Helen!" Her father called. "Where are you, Helen?"_

"_I'm here, Father." She said as she stood from where she'd been thinking by the fire in the library._

"_Helen! It's about time!" He said, dressed in his surgical ensemble. "I need your assistance down in the Sanctuary."_

_She inhaled before she nodded. "Yes, Father."_

_She put away the book at which she'd barely glanced before she followed him, her skirts bustling around behind her._

_Helen's mind was preoccupied with her newly-acquired information about her fiance's macabre pastime as she followed her father to the operation room. Almost without a thought, she prepared herself to be her father's operating assistant, placing a heavy leather apron over her gown and securing her curls in a tight bun at the nape of her neck._

_She quickly washed her hands and joined her father at the operating table. "You requested assistance?" She said as she approached him._

_He nodded. "Yes, Helen." He said, bustling around the small operating room. "I've sedated him for the procedure."_

_She nodded slowly as the room began swimming._

"_Helen?" Her father asked, studying her._

"_Father?" She asked, faintly, as the chemical smells of the room overwhelmed her._

"_Helen!" He cried as she fainted._

_-_

"I found out only a few days after I knew for sure what you had been doing." She admitted.

"How did you find out, Helen? I never did ask you."

She swallowed. "I...came across your journal. You wrote every single detail down with vivid description..."

He winced. "I'm not proud of those days, Helen."

"I never said you were." She said, looking back at him. "Still, I recognized details that only James would have known as an investigator with Scotland Yard. I couldn't imagine that anyone other than the killer would have such an accurate depiction of the event, and so, I put two and two together."

He nodded. "And a few days later, you discovered that you were carrying my child. That must have made you all the more ill."

She looked at him, somewhat uncomfortably. "My father brought up the possibility. By then, he knew you were doing something behind our backs though he didn't know what."

"I suppose it was a natural assumption, given how little he actually liked me." He said with a soft sigh.

She winced slightly as she remembered her father's reaction.

-

"_Helen, I've had my suspicions for the last several weeks that you and John have been carrying on more than conversation." Gregory Magnus said as he looked out the window with his back turned to his daughter._

_She swallowed bile as she looked at her hands, clasped in her lap._

_He began to turn, but paused as he looked at her. "I have not interfered because you are a rather determined young woman, but I have to ask this."_

_She looked up at him, fearful that she had disappointed him._

"_Helen, I will believe you no matter what you say." He began gently as he studied her face soberly. "Is there any chance that you are carrying John Druitt's child?"_

_Her mind swam as she realized that it could be very possible that she, Helen Magnus, was carrying a child belonging to the criminal that the London papers had termed "Jack the Ripper" within her._

_Tears welled up in her eyes as she nodded slowly. "It...is possible..." She managed._

"_I see." He said, soberly. "And I suppose you also know that ever since your engagement, he has been up to no good."_

_She looked away as she blinked away tears. She nodded slowly again._

_He sighed. "Well, what are you going to do, Helen?"_

"_I am going to test my blood for any anomalies before I take any course of action." She whispered_

"_And if you are carrying his child?"_

_She swallowed as she looked up at him. "I don't know." She admitted, vulnerably._

-

"It's not that he didn't like you..." She tried to reason. "It's just that..."

"I was a serial killer who had left you, the best thing that had ever happened to me, with a broken heart and an unplanned pregnancy." He said, seriously. "Even I didn't like myself for what I'd done to you."

She swallowed emotion down. He was so different – more like the man with whom she'd fallen in love more than a century ago. Still, there was a tortured side to him now; a side that frightened her almost more than the psychopath she'd shot in a dark alley one hundred and twenty years ago. His spirit had been broken when Tesla had shocked him into sanity, and Ashley's disappearance and death had led him to the brink of desperation.

As she'd learned from firsthand experience, desperation made a person unpredictable.

"When did you decide to save the pregnancy for later?"

"It was Father's idea." She admitted. "His work in cryogenics had recently borne fruit, and he thought it might keep me safer..."

-

"_Helen," Gregory announced as he knocked on her door._

"_Yes, Father?" She asked as she stood from where she'd been reclining._

"_May I come in?"_

_She nodded. "Of course."_

_He sat beside her with a heavy sigh._

"_Is something wrong?" She asked, studying him._

_He looked away before he looked back at her. "Where did you go last night? I saw you leave."_

_She inhaled before she told him what she thought he could handle. "I...went to meet John..."_

"_With a pistol?" He asked with another sigh._

_She swallowed nervously._

"_What's going on, Helen?"He asked, seriously._

_She bit her lip, looking over at the table upon which John's journal sat. She looked at her father before she stood and walked over to it. She leaned upon it for a moment before she returned to her father's side, and offered the book to him. "I found this a few days ago..."_

"_Oh?"_

_She nodded. "The last entry is the one that revealed everything to me."_

_He accepted the book, looking at her as he did so. Only a moment later, he had turned to the final entry and began to read it._

_Helen paced the floor, biting her nail worriedly as she waited for her father's reaction. She glanced back at him only to find that his face was just as expressionless as it had been before she'd given him the journal. For some reason that made her even more nervous._

_He finally looked back up at her._

"_You know there's no prison built that could hold him, Father." She whispered. "I did what I needed to do."_

"_Did you succeed?"_

_She shook her head. "He disappeared as I fired."_

_His eyes were dark with worry as he stood and walked over to her. "You're going to be his next target, Helen."_

_She swallowed as she looked down at the floor. "Better me than his other victims."_

"_Helen, you have more potential to change the course of the human race than a common prostitute."_

"_Father!" She cried in absolute shock. "Are you condoning his actions?"_

"_Of course not, Helen." He said, shaking his head. "But if you want to be a part of the Sanctuary, then you must give up your own self-importance."_

_She bit her lip in shame._

"_Helen, your work is of the most importance. Your life is not your own anymore."_

_She looked almost nauseous before she looked at her father. "I'm not sure I can do this, Father."_

"_I told you, Helen, that before you saw the Sanctuary for what it is, that you cannot turn back."_

"_No, Father," she said, shaking her head. "This child...I'm not sure I can raise this child if I know that John is still a threat."_

"_What would you do? Druitt would simply find the child..."_

_She felt tears slip silently down her cheeks as her father sighed. _

_"Perhaps you should consider freezing the embryo." He suggested quietly. "My cryogenics work has been marginally successful, and you could bring the child to term when John is no longer a threat."  
_

_She looked at him for a moment before she nodded. "I think you're right."_

"_There is still some risk involved, Helen." He said, seriously. "To you and to the embryo."_

"_I know."_

"_I don't know how long your recovery would be since your physiology is different from an average human."_

_She nodded. "I know, Father. I trust you."_

_He sighed heavily. "We should probably do it sooner rather than later."_

"_Is tomorrow too soon?"_

_He shook his head. "No."_

"_Then perhaps that would be the best time." She said, swallowing her nervousness. "But first, I believe I need to pay a call to James."_

"_Watson?"_

_She nodded. "Yes."_

"_Are you going to tell him what you learned?"_

"_How can I not?" She asked, nervously. "If I am going to be recuperating from surgery, I need someone who can keep an eye on John's whereabouts."_

"_And do what needs to be done?"_

_She inhaled before she nodded. "Yes."_

-

"Keep you safer from me." He continued.

She bit her lip as she nodded. "Yes, actually..."

"When did you tell Watson what you knew? He couldn't have known from the clues; he, himself, admitted that he never wanted to see the truth."

"The night that I'd decided to have Ashley's embryo frozen."

-

"_Helen?" James greeted somewhat curiously as he walked into the parlor. "May I help you?"_

_She bit her lip as she turned from where she'd been studying his extensive library. "James."_

"_Are you all right?" He asked, concerned. "You don't look well."_

"_It will pass." She said as she shook her head._

"_Why are you here, Helen?" He asked, studying her carefully._

_She revealed the journal from underneath her cape. "Read the last entry."_

_He studied her carefully as he accepted the journal. "What's in here?"_

"_The identity of the Ripper." She said, swallowing._

"_How did you get the journal, Helen?" He asked, studying her eyes for clues into what she knew._

_She looked down at the ground as she closed her eyes._

"_It can't be true," he sighed heavily as he looked at the journal._

"_Just read it, James." She whispered._

_He nodded as he turned to the last entry. Within a few sentences, he had closed his eyes before throwing the journal onto the couch in a fit of emotion._

_She jumped slightly in surprise._

"_How could this have happened?" He demanded angrily. "I took him into my confidence! I asked for his assistance!"_

_Helen winced slightly as she heard him vent his frustrations._

"_For years I have gone to him as my dearest friend, and he betrayed me!"_

"_And how am I supposed to feel, James?" She finally burst. "You are not the only one whom he betrayed in pursuit of his perverse pastime. If only I knew that he was gone for good. If only I knew that my bullet had pierced him in the heart like his madness has pierced mine!"_

_James looked at her incredulously. "You tried to kill him?"_

"_What was I supposed to do, James? Leave him to kill again?" She demanded angrily. She mellowed slightly as she turned from him. "I have enough lives on my conscience, thank you very much."_

"_He'll come after you now." James said, worriedly._

_She sighed. "I know, and I've made provisions to leave for a short while."_

"_A short while?" He asked, skeptically. "He is not going to rest until you're dead. He is a patient man, and a short wait is not much of an obstacle."_

"_John Druitt will not keep me from my destiny." She vowed, defiantly. "No matter how hard he tries."_

_He sighed, looking down at the ground before he looked back up at her. "You only told me so that I could keep a look out for him while you're away, didn't you?"_

_She looked to the side in shame as she hid her face from him with her wide-brimmed hat, and he took her silence as the affirmative answer he'd been expecting. "Well, we should have the element of surprise. According to what I told him at the club yesterday, he believes I know next to nothing about the case."_

_She bit the inside of her cheek as she studied him._

"_Perhaps I should invite Nigel to assist me." He mused. "After all, the proper channels will be of no use to us. Not if John is the Ripper."_

_She bit back a cry of incredulity. She'd offered him the only evidence that he would ever need. "Why do you think I tried to reason with him on my own?" She replied._

_He sighed as he looked over at her. "Only you, Helen, would try to reason with someone, and bring a pistol along for insurance."_

_She swallowed down bile. She felt so sickened by the whole thing; she just wanted to awaken from this nightmare._

-

"Obviously your father performed the surgery in such a manner that you and Ashley were unharmed." He observed.

She nodded as she shook off the memory. "Yes, he did."

"So after following the path of science for a hundred years, you decided to bring the fetus to term." He prodded.

She nodded. "After I was certain that you had gone forever."

"Perhaps I should get myself a drink before we go down this path again."

Helen felt intense irritation bubble up within her. "Your Jekyll and Hyde transformation played a rather pivotal role in the way that my life ran its course, John." She reminded him, harshly. "As a result, it also had quite a bearing on whether or not I was willing to bring Ashley to term in the first place."

He sighed; he really wanted something to drink. Something to dull the pain of her accusations.

"Whether you like it or not, John, your madness is going to come up anytime we talk about Ashley."

"Then perhaps we should not discuss her at all." He finally said with a sigh. "Perhaps I was mistaken in believing that there were any sparks left from the past."

Helen swallowed before she stood as calmly as she could. "Perhaps you were." She finally managed. She prayed that he wouldn't see the uncertainty in her eye as she said it. After all, she was so confused, having lost Ashley so recently. Her world had literally crumbled around her as she continued to feel the aftershocks of the attacks on the Sanctuary Global Network.

Even now, her one reasonable sounding board was dead: her good friend and colleague James Watson had been the first to perish in the bloodshed begun by the Cabal. Every part of her ached to scream at the heavens and give up on life, but she knew that she could never do so. Her father's warning that her life was no longer her own had rung too soundly through her soul.

Suddenly, she felt John's breath on her face, and she looked up into his eyes.

"Helen," he whispered as tenderly as he had back in London.

She swallowed. Was she truly strong enough to resist him?

"John..." She whispered as he kissed her soundly. She could only hope that he was of as sound a mind as he seemed to be. She couldn't bear for history to repeat itself.


	5. Confusion

"_John! This ends here!' She cried as she watched him withdraw the blade from his walking stick._

"_Helen, what a lovely surprise." He managed as he placed the blade back into its case and turned to her. "Molly, I'd like you to meet my fiance. Or should I say, former fiance, Helen Magnus. Dr. Helen Magnus."_

"_Doctor, I'm pleased to meet you, ma'am." The prostitute managed, nervously. "Well, I'll be on my way."_

"_Stay,"He said, catching her by the arm. "I insist."_

"_John, let me help you before you make things worse." She tried to reason as she fingered the pistol she hid beneath her cape._

"_And how is that possible? I've already murdered, what? Seven whores?" He sneered. "How could one more make the slightest difference?"_

_The dream-version of the dark alley of London morphed into the Sanctuary's common room as Ashley and the other enhanced abnormals appeared in a circle around her._

"_Ashley!" She cried as tears ran down her face._

"_What more have I to lose?" John asked as they closed in on her like primitive animals circling their prey.  
_

"_Ashley, please." She begged as she looked at her daughter. "Don't do this. I know you're still in there!"_

_Ashley sneered at her as she bared her teeth and allowed her vampiric characteristics to come to the surface. She swiped her razor-sharp nails at her mother, slicing her forearm as she raised it above her face. _

_"No!" She cried in agony as her blood spilled on the ground.  
_

"No!" She moaned as she struggled to leave the nightmare behind her.

"No! No! Ashley!" She cried out as she finally awoke.

Tears stained her cheeks as she tried to calm the pounding of her heart.

"Ashley," she sobbed. "Ashley."

"Helen?" John asked as he awoke from beside her.

She gasped as she looked beside her and remembered how a few moments of tender reminiscing had turned into a night of passion.

"Helen?" He asked again, sitting up beside her. He'd clearly had the first good night's sleep he'd known in over a hundred years. "Are you all right?"

She swallowed. "Go back to sleep, John. I...I'll be fine."

"Are you sure?" He asked, looking deeply into her eyes as she saw a piece of the tender lover she'd lost in England reappear in his eyes.

She swallowed, trying to remember all of the reasons why this was wrong. "Yes, John. I'll be fine." She said, nodding. "But I do have some work that needs to be done."

"I'll go with you."

"No." She replied instantly.

He looked at her somewhat puzzled.

She swallowed. "I mean...you need your rest. You've been under a strain lately. I'll be fine."

He shrugged as he rolled over and returned to his uneasy rest.


	6. Turmoil

"Magnus, why is Druitt still here?" Will asked as he entered the study several hours later. "Doesn't he usually use us just as a home base? Isn't he usually flashing around the world?"

"I don't know what his plans are, Will." She said, looking up at him from where she was focusing on her work. "Contrary to popular belief, I do not know everything that goes through his mind."

"Maybe not, but I'm not sure you're as clueless as you're pretending to be."

She looked at him, somewhat annoyed.

"Look, there have been some...rumors..."

"About me." She deduced with a raised eyebrow.

"And Druitt."

She sighed.

"Look, he's an ex. That makes things complicated."

"He's also a serial killer, Will, who has lost his mind."

"Until recently, yes, but no one would blame you for having...feelings..."

"Feelings." She said somewhat skeptically. "I may be a little confused right now, but I can't afford to give in to feelings."

"I wasn't asking whether or not you could afford to give into them." He said, studying her carefully.

"Then you don't trust me?"

"I never said that either." He said, seriously.

"Then I suggest that you leave my personal life alone." She said, seriously.

There was a knock at the door, and John stood in the doorway with a bouquet of flowers in one hand. "Am I interrupting?"

Will looked at John, and then he looked at Helen. "Uh...no. I was just leaving..."

Helen sighed as she saw the wheels turn in his mind. She sank back into her office chair with a sigh as she placed a hand on her temple.

"Something wrong, Helen?" John asked as he walked into the study.

"Only that Will believes you're still here because of me."

"Is there something wrong with that?" He asked, offering her the bouquet.

She swallowed as she took the flowers from him. "John, I think we need to talk..."

He sighed. "I thought you were going to say that."

"We can't do what we did last night...ever again."

"I would ask what you're afraid of, but I suppose that's rather apparent." He said with a sigh.

"One hundred and twenty years of anguish are rather difficult to overcome, John. I can't just pretend that they didn't happen."

He nodded. "I suppose you're right. I should see what I can do for the sanctuary elsewhere."

"You needn't leave, John. You may want to simply distance yourself."

"Helen, I need to leave." He said seriously. "I've never been able to keep you out of my mind."

"How do you see this working out, John?" She demanded seriously. "As it is, my staff is unsure that they can trust my judgment."

"I don't believe that's true, Helen. You have the most experience of anyone here when it comes to the care of abnormal creatures."

She sighed. "John, I have Will asking about why you're still here when you would normally be flitting about the world. Granted, he is the most observant of them all, but it will not escape their notice, and I believe it will be a cause of concern."

"If you wish to end this, Helen, you need not offer excuses." He said, rising. "But at least allow me the dignity of knowing that it was your decision to end this – not some curious alignment of the stars!"

She was silent for a moment before she inhaled and exhaled loudly. "Truth be told, John, it's your condition which frightens me most."

He turned to study her, and she bit the inside of her cheek before she continued. "You lost your mind once, and I dare say that you will lose it again."

He looked away solemnly.

"I could never prescribe electroshock therapy as treatment for madness, your mad self would never submit yourself to it willingly, and Tesla will not be at my beck and call forever."

"Then I suppose we have a problem." He said, perceptively.

"Yes, John." She said, nodding. "We do have a problem."

"You treated me once before."

"The treatment was ineffective." She countered. "I left for a short while, you stopped your treatments, and then you started killing. I would need to start from scratch on a method of controlling your condition."

"And my power..."

"Would most likely be inert." She said with a sigh. "As if you were a regular human again."

He swallowed. "I would be entirely dependent on you, Helen. I'm not sure how I feel about that."

She bit her lip. "Then we have come to the root of our problem, John. You don't wish to depend on me, and I can't trust that you'll keep your sanity if you do not."

"What would happen when I grew old, Helen?" He asked, looking at her seriously. "While you remain looking as youthful as you did when we first parted in London?"

She looked away as tears welled up in her eyes.

"Helen?" He prodded gently.

"Do you know how many lovers I have buried, John?" She asked with tortured anguish lining her features. "And do you know how many times I have wished that I could not be as...timeless...as I seem to be?"

"Seeing me grow old would cause you more pain than asking me to leave now?"

"Either way, there will be pain." She admitted softly. "And no intimately tender touch, softly spoken word, or happily shared memory can change that."

"What do you want, Helen?" He asked, looking her directly in the eye.

"Don't ask me that, John." She whispered.

"Why? Because you've forgotten what that is?" He challenged.

"You're shouting, John." She said, avoiding the question. "Please restrain yourself."

"No, Helen, I want an answer." He demanded, hitting his fist on her desk.

She jumped in surprise at his unpredictability.

"Something wrong?" Bigfoot asked, poking his head into the study.

Helen looked at John as he inhaled and turned. "No. I was just leaving."

The Sasquatch waited as John turned back to her. "I hope you make up your mind, Helen, and soon. After all, choosing not to make a decision is in and of itself a decision. I only hope that you can live with the consequences."

She swallowed as he slipped past her hairy friend who watched him go before looking back in on Helen. "Are you all right?" He asked, looking over at her.

She sighed as she nodded. "Yes. I'll be fine."

"If he's bothering you..."

"No," she said, shaking her head. "He's right. I need to make a decision, and be prepared to live with the consequences."


	7. Ashley

"_What is it this time, Mom?" Ashley asked as Helen met her in the bell tower._

"_It's your father." She said, shaking her head. "He is the most stubborn man I've ever met."_

"_Besides Grandfather, right?" She teased._

_Helen chuckled as she looked over at her daughter. "Yes, besides your grandfather."_

_The warm breeze blew her hair back behind her, and she closed her eyes as she felt the air caress her face gently._

"_Do you still love him?" Ashley asked, soberly, after a moment of silence._

_Helen opened her eyes as the magical moment passed before she looked back at her daughter. She sighed. "I suppose there is a portion of me that will always...appreciate everything he gave me..."_

_Ashley raised an eyebrow, and Helen looked back over the city she'd chosen to make her home. "He gave me more than pain and heartache, Ashley." She said, softly. She turned back to her daughter with a tender smile. "He gave me you, didn't he?"_

"_Back to the pain and heartache..." Ashley teased._

_Helen chuckled somewhat mirthlessly as she studied her daughter. She wanted to drink in every detail so that she could revisit this dream over and over again. "I miss you, Ashley. You were the best thing that ever happened to me."_

"_I miss you too." She said soberly. "But I'm closer than you think."_

_Helen bit the inside of her cheek as she looked back out over the landscape._

"_Mom, I know you're confused right now about a lot of things, but...you don't have to be alone."_

_Helen sighed. "And forget everything that has happened over the last hundred years, Ashley?"_

"_No." She said, shaking her head. "But maybe you can have a little faith."_

"_In what?"_

"_In Dad."_

"_I've never stopped having faith in him, Ashley." She said, seriously. "But it's too complicated..."_

"_I never said it wasn't complicated, Mom." She said, standing behind her now as she placed a hand on Helen's shoulder. "But you always told me that there is no such thing as coincidence. And maybe...Dad coming back and being better isn't such a bad thing. I mean, you were willing to let him into my life, weren't you?"_

"_He never gave me much of a choice."_

"_When did that ever stop you, Mom?"_

_Helen inhaled as she pursed her lips and looked over at her daughter. "When did you become so wise?"_

_Ashley smiled. "You can do this, Mom. It won't be happily ever after, but you always told me that a few moments of joy were worth a lifetime of pain."_

"_I seem to have been quite outspoken in the span of your lifetime." Helen said, wryly._

"_I didn't mind."_

"_Much." Helen added with an affectionate smile._

_Ashley nodded as she conceded the point._

_Helen took a deep breath before she looked back at the view from the bell tower. "I don't know if I can go through it again, Ashley. History tends to repeat itself every few hundred years or so, and I'd hate to find myself hating him again."_

"_You haven't lived more than two centuries yet, Mom." Ashley said with a smile. "Maybe this time will turn out differently. But I promise – if Dad leaves you again, and shows up when you're three hundred years old, I'll tell you to run."_

_Helen couldn't help but laugh through her tears before she looked back at Ashley. "I love you, Ashley. I always have, and I always will."_

"_I know." She said with a supportive smile._

"_I suppose I have a few words to exchange with your father."_

"_He's gone. You'll have to wait until he gets back from wherever it is that he went this time."_

_Helen nodded, soberly. Perhaps what she wanted was more of a guarantee that he would never kill again._

"_That may never happen, Mom." Ashley said, softly. "But I have it on good authority that he's less willing to kill people who haven't struck first."_

_She nodded. "Perhaps that's the only compromise I can expect."_

"_He still loves you, Mom. Believe it or not, that's why he hated you so deeply for so long."_

"_I always hated that irony." She sighed._

"_Your life is irony, Mom." Ashley pointed out._

"_I know." Helen said after a moment._

"_Good-bye, Mom." Ashley said as she faded into the night._

Helen awoke once again, but this time, she looked at the vaulted ceilings of her study from where she lay on the sofa. She felt the tears on her cheeks. Would the pain ever leave? Would she ever find true happiness again?

Could she deny that Ashley's words had rung true with her?

Could she deny that John Druitt had always spelled disaster for her in the past?

The clock struck five o'clock, and she sighed. She'd finally fallen into an uneasy sleep at nearly two-thirty, and now she was going to go to work.

Her body ached with weariness. Perhaps she would take a vacation when the rebuilding was over. Of all of her years, this year had earned her the right to a sabbatical. This much was true.


	8. Mourning

Helen walked into the dining room later that morning, and caught Kate speaking with Henry. They were exchanging their unique brands of wit when she poured herself a cup of tea from the morning tea service. "Good morning." She managed, politely.

Henry looked over with a smile. "Morning, Magnus."

Kate looked at her for a moment before she offered an insincere "hi", and hurried off.

Helen sighed as Will's words echoed through her mind. _"You know, you might want to spend a little less time with Jack the Ripper. It's affecting your manners somewhat."_

She winced internally as she wondered how she could reach out to the young woman without seeming insincere or eager to replace her daughter.

Truthfully, like Clara, Kate reminded her a great deal of Ashley. A killer instinct, a hidden vulnerability that came from an uncertainty that she was truly needed in this world, and the marked increase in bravado that came when anyone challenged her skills. All of these things had been in Ashley to one degree or another. Perhaps that had been the final straw that had forced her to behave so irrationally. How could someone so much like her own daughter be alive and perfectly well when her daughter had been captured, tortured, and morphed into a monster?

She hated that word, but she had to admit that sometimes it was the only thing that would suffice.

"Henry?" She asked, stirring her tea.

"Yes?" He asked, turning back to her.

"You seem to have become friends with Kate."

He nodded. "She looked like she could use one."

She bit the inside of her cheek as she looked at the door through which Kate had left. "What would be the best way to apologize for how I've treated her through all of this?'

He shifted his weight somewhat uncomfortably. "I'm not sure you can, Magnus." He admitted. "I mean, you're a great woman, and all, but...Kate relies on her first impressions. They keep her alive in her line of work, and...well, let's face it. You didn't have a great one."

She sighed. "I know." She said, nodding slowly.

"But she's grateful for the accommodations, even if she won't say so, and I think she'll realize that you were just desperate."

"Just desperate..." She echoed, hollowly.

"Did I say something wrong?" He asked, curiously.

She shook her head. "No, Henry, it wasn't you."

"Okay," he finally shrugged.

She studied the young man for a moment before she looked into her tea, trying to gather the courage to ask him the question she had on her mind.

"Henry?" She finally began.

"Yes?"

She looked up at him. "You do realize that you're like the son I never had, don't you?"

He looked taken aback by her question before he nodded. "Yeah."

She inhaled slowly before she managed a small smile. "Good."

They were silent for a moment before he looked back up at her. "You know Ashley always looked up to you, right?"

She looked over at him as tears moistened her eyes.

"Not a day went by when we were kids where she didn't tell me that she wanted to be just like you."

By now, she was trying to retain her composure.

"You meant the world to her, Magnus."

She tried to swallow down a few of her tears before she looked back up. "As a mother, you wonder if pushed too hard, if you were too lenient, or if you'll ever be the friends you so desperately wish to be."

He waited for her to finish as she paused to keep from losing her composure. "I just...I wish we would have had a few more years to be friends."

He bit his lip before he reached over and hugged her gently.

She returned the hug before she pulled away, trying to wipe at her eyes discreetly. "Thank you, Henry." She managed, gratefully.

"Anytime, Doc." He said with a small half-smile.

"Henry, if you need to talk about Ashley..." She began.

"Magnus, I'm fine." He said, seriously.

She smiled soberly.

"But if anything comes up, I will." He said with a sad smile.

She nodded as she took another sip of her tea. "I need to return to my rounds." She said after a moment as she finished the cup of tea. "I will you at the staff meeting, Henry."

He nodded. "Yes, ma'am. I'll be there."


	9. Decisions

A dark figure passed her in the hallway as she looked at Henry's tablet. She noticed the bald head of her former fiance, and she looked at Henry. "Can we finish talking about this when I go to your office later today?" She asked, looking at him for confirmation.

"What?" He asked, confused. He saw Druitt walking down the hallway with his head bowed. "Oh...yeah..."

"Thank you." She said gratefully as she hurried to catch up to him. "John."

He turned, wearily. "Helen." He sighed.

"May I have a word with you?" She asked, motioning to her study.

"If you must." He agreed somewhat begrudgingly.

He stepped inside, and she closed the door as she took a deep breath. She turned back to him as he sat down on one of the chairs. "You have every right to be put out with me." She said, seriously. "I have been rather...inconsiderate of your feelings."

John looked surprised for only a moment before he schooled his features back into his usual look of condescending smugness. "An apology, Helen? How very unlike you."

She swallowed. Perhaps she had made her decision too hastily. "You do not need your facade with me, John." She finally informed him. "I've always been able to see through it."

He sighed heavily. "What do you want, Helen? I won't ask again."

"I want you." She said, finally. "It won't be perfect, and honestly, if you hurt me again, I will hunt you down, and make you pay."

He inhaled, returning her gaze fully. "I suppose that would be fair after all I've put you through."

"Then I suppose we will give this another try." She said, slowly.

"I suppose we will."

"Well, Henry needed to speak with me about something..." She said, looking at the door.

"And I should get myself settled once more." He said, standing.

She nodded as she looked at her hands which were twisting nervously.

"Helen?"

She looked up at him as she bit her lip for a moment. "Promise me that you will not kill anymore. Not unless one of us is in imminent danger, and it is your only recourse."

He paused for a moment, thoughtfully, before he nodded. "I promise."

"I reserve the right to change my mind about us." She said, softly.

"As you should." He agreed.

"Henry needs me." She whispered.

"Yes, he does." John said, nodding. "And I will let you go if you promise that this evening is mine."

She inhaled somewhat hesitantly before she nodded. "Barring an emergency, this evening is yours."

He smiled tenderly as he leaned in and kissed her cheek. "Until this evening." He said, bowing his head as he left.

She couldn't help but smile softly as she touched her cheek where he'd kissed her gently.

"Baldy do a trick?" Henry asked as he walked into the study.

"What?" She asked, looking over at him.

"You look a little...starry-eyed, Magnus. You and Baldy back together?" He teased.

Helen swallowed as she regrouped. "Let me see your tablet again, Henry. I think I've remembered some of the upgrades I wanted to make to the security system."

Henry looked at her, and realized she'd avoided the question. "You're kidding. You're back with Druitt? For real?"

"I don't see how any of that would be your concern." She said, raising an eyebrow as she looked up at him for a brief moment. "I've always maintained that my personal life has been off-limits."

"Yes, but..." He began.

"Henry, I remember well what you said about him being hearts and flowers one moment, but I'd appreciate it if you were to drop the subject." She said, exasperated.

He sighed as he nodded. "As you wish, Doc."

"Thank you." She said, curtly. "Now, I think that it would be wise to strengthen our shields in case the Cabal rebuilds as quickly as we have."

"I was just thinking that myself." He admitted as he got back to work.

Helen breathed a small sigh of relief as she managed to get his mind off her relationships – as messed up as they had been lately. And this was only the beginning of it, she thought with an internal groan.


	10. Dates

Helen checked her appearance in the mirror with apprehension. A date...she hadn't had one of those since London. She'd had affairs and trysts, but there had rarely been an actual date affixed to those. That made her nervous in and of itself. With the history between John and herself, she was afraid of some inevitable disaster.

Still, she had to admit her curiosity about John's plans for the evening. He'd always been a romantic evening planner.

She looked at her outfit, hoping that it was appropriate for the occasion. A plum-colored, knee-length wrap dress had been paired with a lightweight gray wrap, and black stiletto heels. She'd decided to curl her hair like usual, allowing it to cascade over her shoulders. With diamond earrings, a matching diamond pendant on a chain, and tasteful amount of evening makeup, she felt that she might be finished with her preparations.

There was a gentle rap on the door, and she inhaled sharply before she walked over and opened her door. On the other side, she saw John who was dressed in a suit which mirrored Tesla's normal look.

"Good evening, Helen." He said with a small smile.

"Hello, John." She said, mirroring his smile. "Did Nicola give you the number for his tailor?" She asked with a somewhat amused chuckle.

He grimaced for a moment before he nodded. "But it did little good as his tailor had been dead for nearly a decade. I found it necessary to actually wear one of his suits with a few alterations as I am quite taller than he is."

"It is a handsome suit." She smiled.

"Thank you." He said as he studied her. "You look lovely as ever, Helen."

"Thank you, John." She said, graciously. "I was unsure of what your plans were for the evening, and so I tried to choose an outfit which would be fairly universal."

"You look perfect." He assured as he offered his arm to her. "Shall we?"

She nodded as they walked through the corridors of the sanctuary.

"What are we going to do, John?" She asked, looking up at him.

"That, my dear, is going to be a surprise." He said as they reached the front door. He opened the door for her, and they walked beyond the limits of the electromagnetic field. He stopped, and turned to face her.

She looked at him, somewhat confused at their pause.

He took hold of her hands with a smile as he transported them away from the Sanctuary.

She looked around as they returned to the space and time to which they were familiar. "John!" She gasped as she noticed the small candlelit cafe table in a luscious garden. "Where are we?"

"You don't know?" He asked as he guided her to the table. "The Botanic Gardens at Oxford University."

"Really?" She asked, curiously. "But it's so much warmer than I remember Oxford in September."

"That's because it's June."

"June?" She asked, confused.

"Your favorite month." He said as he nodded. "That's the beauty of being able to bend space and time."

"Where are we, John?" She asked more seriously. "Or perhaps a better question would be "when" are we?"

"June of 1883."

"John!" She cried in absolute astonishment. "And should we alter the course of history..."

He chuckled at her expression. "Helen, it is also two o'clock in the morning."

She couldn't help but smile at the memories which seeped into her mind again. "We would walk in these gardens every evening when we had finished our coursework."

"And only a few hours before we began our unapproved experiments with the Five." He reminisced. "Around this time of night if memory serves correctly."

She chuckled softly as she gave him a small half-smile. He helped her to her chair, and she offered him a small smile in gratitude.

"If there had been such a thing as take-out when we had been at Oxford, I would have found something from this century, but I suppose this will have to do." He said, giving her the small platter he'd prepared.

She looked at it, and then at him. "What is it?"

"Henry informed me that you had a favorite restaurant in New City."

"Oh?" She asked, surprised.

"And I made my first carry-out order."

"I'm quite proud of you." She teased as he offered the dish to her.

"I was also told to order Indian curry. I hope that the selection was appropriate."

"Quite." She said with a nod.

"Then my source is a good one." He said with a faint smile as they began to eat their dinner.

They were quiet for a few moments before Helen looked up at him. "You needn't try so hard, John." She said, softly.

"This?" He asked, looking at the garden. "This was nothing."

"No, it wasn't." She countered, gently.

He sighed. "I could never make up for all that I've done to you, Helen."

"And while the offer is a wonderful gesture," she said, leaning across the table to catch his gaze. "It is entirely unnecessary."

He smiled a soft and sad smile as she gently caressed his hand on the table. "We worked really well together, Helen. As partners in our work and in our relationship."

She nodded in agreement as she waited for him to continue.

"I cannot believe I was stupid enough to throw it all away."

"John, you were hardly yourself." She said, compassionately.

"Perhaps, but the thought of what I allowed to happen in London all those years ago still haunts me." He admitted.

Helen bit the inside of her cheek before she pulled her chair closer to his. "John, I must admit that they were dark times." She began. "But as I was considering whether or not I wanted to give this relationship another try or not, I remembered something that I had told Ashley all of her life. I told her that a few moments of joy were worth a lifetime of pain."

He pondered that for a moment, and she took his hand in hers. "John, our extended lives have been lives of pain at times, but even in the darkest times, there have been moments where I could see the joy in living." She looked into his eyes. "John, you were the one who taught me to do that. Besides my father, you were the one who supported my endeavors to attend medical school at a time when women were refused entrance."

"You were more talented than the staff at Oxford Medical School." He said, seriously. "How could I not have believed in your success."

She smiled softly. "You organized the Five in response to my desire to perform additional and less conventional experiments."

"That was not hard." He laughed mirthlessly. "Tesla had been tailing me in an effort to become more popular, and I had been friends with Watson and Griffin since we attended St. Paul's School together as boys."

"And you all became my dearest friends." She reminded him.

"I think we all fell a little bit in love with you." He chuckled.

She shuddered internally. "Don't say that – it was Nicola's argument for why I should help him revive the vampire species."

"Was it really?" He asked, surprised. "You never told me that."

"He retracted his statement when I refused." She assured. "And then, he tried to kill me."

"That sounds like Tesla." He growled. "The man has no true emotion – just an unholy delight in manipulating everyone around him."

She took another bite of her curry as she refrained from mentioning that he'd done the same in London. Finally, she looked back up at him, curiously. "You said that you all fell a little bit in love with me."

He nodded. "You are a very attractive woman, Helen. With the manners and intelligence to match."

She offered him an amused smile. "Nigel and James never expressed an interest in me."

"They were my friends." He said with a shrug.

She nodded slowly.

"And by the time you had rescinded my offer of marriage, Nigel had already married himself. Only James still carried a torch for you."

She shook his head. "James had no feelings for me."

He raised an eyebrow. "Of course he did, Helen. How else do you account for his celibacy? He could have had his choice of female companionship," He said, seriously. "But he knew that you were not interested in a relationship, and so he kept them to himself. He told me so before we went to the Ruins in India."

"James was too private a person to have told you that." She countered. "Especially then."

"It was not his words, Helen, but his manner which told me of his affections." He said as he looked her in the eye. "He cornered me and told me in no uncertain terms that unless I vowed to save you the pain and heartache of our early years, he would find some way to punish me." He sighed as he thought of his deceased friend. "His body may have been feeble, but his courage was as iron-strong as it had ever been. Especially when it came to you, Helen."

"And I never knew." She said, softly as she shook her head. The threads of memories with James tugged at her mind like an eager dog pulled at his owner's pant leg playfully. "I should have..."

-

"_Helen?" James asked as he entered her study._

_She looked up from the stack of papers on which she'd been working. "Yes, James?"_

"_You've shut yourself in here for several days. Is there anything the matter?"_

"_No," she lied._

"_You're certain."_

"_Yes."_

"_Then the significance of this day is lost on you." He challenged._

"_What?" She asked, looking at him confused._

"_Helen, this is the day on which you should have married John in Christ's Church Cathedral."_

_She inhaled sharply as she looked away._

"_Would you like to talk about it?"_

"_No."_

"_Helen, you've only just returned from a sabbatical in which your sole objective was to hide from your former fiance."_

_She looked at him curiously before she nodded, remembering the story she'd shared with him. "Oh...yes..."_

"_You weren't on sabbatical, were you?" He said, noticing her telltale signs of deception._

_She sighed as she stood to file away some papers. "No."_

_He noticed her paleness and how gingerly she'd moved about her study. "You are ill."_

_She shook her head. "No."_

"_You were ill." He countered. "Your father probably performed a surgery of some kind."_

_She closed her eyes in pain as she remembered the surgery. It had been successful as far as they'd been able to determine. The embryo had been frozen, and she had begun a rapid recovery. Still, there was something about the procedure that had felt so unnatural. She felt like she'd lost something precious. Finally, she inhaled and turned. "Yes."_

"_Why didn't you simply tell me, Helen?"_

_She swallowed. "It was complicated."_

"_Illness and surgery are complicated?" He asked, raising an eyebrow._

_She nodded. "At times."_

"_Was it something to do with an abnormal?"_

_Of sorts, she thought to herself. After all, she and John were both abnormals now. "It was a procedure that I wished to hide from John, and I was afraid that if I told anyone that it might get back to him. I was more vulnerable, and if I had not hidden the procedure from everyone, he may have taken the opportunity to take my life then and there."_

_He nodded slowly, but Helen could see in his eye that he didn't believe her. At least not fully._

"_All right, Helen." He said, nodding. "As long as you are recovering well."_

"_According to Father, I will be my old self within a matter of days."_

_He nodded. "Where is Gregory? I had something I wished to discuss with him."_

"_I believe that he's in the Sanctuary." She said, returning to her paperwork._

-

"Helen?" John probed gently.

She shook herself, and looked back at him. "Oh, John, I'm...I'm sorry."

"Are you all right?"

She nodded. "I just was thinking about James."

"Ah." He said, nodding slowly.

"He was the most sensible of us all." She chuckled.

"His interest in abnormal creatures was more curiosity than science." He said, nodding.

She chuckled as she thought of her young protege, Will Zimmerman. "I almost wonder if James didn't know about the existence of abnormals before any of the rest of us."

John thought about it for a moment as she continued. "Perhaps his deductions led him to a reasoning that there must be other sentient life than just humans."

"Perhaps." He conceded as he tipped his wine glass toward her in a wordless toast to her brilliance.

-

It was only a few hours before they returned to the Sanctuary, and walked through the gates together, arm in arm.

"This evening was lovely, John." Helen admitted as she looked up at him affectionately.

"Then it fulfilled its purpose." He said with a grin.

"There have been times over the last century," she began seriously. "When I wondered how I could have fallen in love with you."

He tensed slightly. It had been such a wonderful evening – without many references to the actions he'd taken in his madness.

"But then, I remember moments like this." She whispered, looking at him with soft eyes. "When you and I would walk in the moonlight, and talk about the meaning of our work."

"And?" He asked, looking down at her.

"And I find myself falling in love with you again." She admitted, looking down at the ground as they reached the door to her home and sanctuary.

He turned to her, and touched a finger to her chin as he forced her to look up at him. Without a word, he leaned down and kissed her gently. When they parted, he smiled. "Good night, Helen."

"You aren't staying?"

"And let your staff see us arm-in-arm?" He asked with an eyebrow raised. He smiled softly. "Go on, Helen. I will follow later."

"John, that's not necessary." She said, realizing how deeply she'd hurt him with the thought that her image would be ruined if they had resumed their affair.

"I have much to do before our young selves find the sight of our moonlit dinner." He said with an affectionate smile. "But I pledge on the honor I so desperately wish I still had, that I will return."

"Very well." She said, opening the door. "Then I shall wait, and offer you a nightcap at that time."

He shook his head. "Tomorrow is undoubtedly a day filled with adventure, and you will need your rest. Perhaps another time."

"You are a curious man, John Druitt." She said, softly.

"Thank you." He said with a faint smile before he turned and left.

She closed the door, and turned to find Will Zimmerman standing in the foyer with his arms folded across his chest. "Was that who I think it was?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about." She said, walking toward the corridor.

"Oh, I think you do." He countered. "You just don't want to talk about it."

She turned to him in frustration. "I had been making my own decisions for a century by the time you had been born." She said, seriously. "I doubt that my decision-making is as poor as you would insinuate."

"Because Jack the Ripper was the high point of your self-restraint." He said, sarcastically.

Her eyes darkened. "Kindly refrain from speaking of things which you know nothing about."

"Oh, I know what I'm talking about." He countered as she tried to leave again. "He's like the real Jekyll and Hyde, and all you can see right now is the Jekyll. I'm asking you to stop before Hyde destroys everything we've worked for."

She looked back at him with supreme hurt in her eyes before she returned to her path down the corridor toward her study.

"Magnus!" He called after her.

She ignored him.

Bigfoot walked past Will, and shook his head.

"What?" Will asked, looking at him. "Tell me I'm wrong, Big Guy."

The Sasquatch just shook his head again and continued on his way.


	11. Kisses

There was a knock on the door, and Helen wiped at her eyes before she stood. "Who is it?"

"It's me, John."

She was perplexed as she went to open the door.

He offered her the wrap, she'd accidentally left behind in the Oxford Botanical Garden. "I found this, and thought I might return it."

"Thank you." She said, accepting it as she managed a smile.

"Is something wrong, Helen?'

She swallowed before she shrugged. "I don't know."

"Would you like to talk about it?"

She opened the door, and motioned for him to enter. He entered, and she sighed as she closed the door. "Will met me at the door when I returned home."

"Ah."

"And he determined to be my conscience in this relationship."

"Isn't that why you hired him?" John asked, knowingly.

She inhaled as she walked over to the bar, and prepared two brandies. "Yes. And no."

"I think that requires more than a little bit of explanation..."

She managed a small half-smile as she offered him one of the sniffers. "I asked him a few months ago to be my anchor to the real world."

"And..."

"And I asked him to do so, trusting that he would not go too far..."

"He said that I was not good for your work."

"He suggested that you were like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and that while I can see Jekyll right now, Hyde was around the corner waiting to destroy all that I've done."

"I see." He said as he took a sip of the brandy. "And you're changing your mind?"

She shook her head. "Actually, his argument shook me a little, but you know me, I like to prove people wrong."

He chuckled mirthlessly before he looked back at her. "Helen, if having me in your life makes it more miserable, then let me leave."

"No." She said, seriously.

"Helen..."

"I am not going to let you leave because Will is wrong about you." She whispered seriously. "In these last few days, you have reminded me more of the man you were before the Ripper emerged. Perhaps you never needed treatments to remain sane, but rather a powerful reason to compel you out of your insanity."

"And the reason would be..."

"Ashley."

"I seem to remember taking her hostage for a vial of your blood." He said, seriously.

She grimaced at the memory.

"What has changed your mind about me, Helen?" He asked, seriously.

She hesitated for a moment. "The look in your eyes."

"Excuse me?" He asked, surprised.

"I knew long before you became the Ripper that something was wrong." She said, soberly. "Your eyes...they had changed..."

"How so?"

"When you and I were engaged, you had a warm, golden fleck that appeared in your eye. Even in the most desperate of times, that tender softness of your eyes reminded me that it would all work out. You lost that sparkle months before you actually started killing anyone."

"I see."

"John." She whispered as she looked deeply into his eyes with the softness of her own. "When you look at me now, I see that sparkle again. It's not very strong, but it's there. And it's getting stronger."

"Are you sure, Helen?" He asked, vulnerably.

She nodded as she reached a hand up as she gently touched her lips to his. For a moment, the fears slipped away, and they were carried away in the ecstasy of their love. She pulled away with a small smile. "Ashley used to listen to a song, and the song itself never appealed to me, but the message was quite appropriate."

"And the message was?" He asked, looking into his healer's eyes.

"If you want to know what is in a man's heart, it's in his kiss." She whispered, softly. She touched his lips gently with her fingers before she looked back up at him. "That was not the kiss of a killer. It was tender and gentle. Not abrasive and forceful."

"I love you, Helen Magnus." He whispered as he leaned in for another kiss.


	12. Sleeping In

Still half-asleep, Helen sighed contentedly as she pulled John's arms further around her though the morning sun's rays began to leak onto the pillow where she lay, trying to pull her from her paradise.

Suddenly, a knock came at the door. "MAGNUS!" Will's voice cried. "Are you in there?"

"I believe the door is for you." John whispered in her ear.

She chuckled softly as she felt his breath on her ear. "Must I leave?"

"You do have a Sanctuary to run, Helen." He teased as he kissed her neck affectionately.

"I suppose I should awaken then." She said, looking over her shoulder to see his face nuzzled against her naked shoulder.

"Preferably before young William wakes the dead."

She grinned as she slipped out of his embrace and into the silken robe beside the bed. She tiptoed over to the door, and opened it a sliver. She poked her head out into the hallway. "May I help you?" She asked, professionally.

"You're still in bed?" Will asked, astounded.

Henry looked away from her, realizing that they'd probably intruded on an intimate moment.

"I do occasionally take the opportunity to "sleep in" as you say." She said with an amused smile. "Is there an emergency?"

"No, I just...we couldn't find you..." Will said, lamely.

"Then I will join you for the staff meeting in two hours. As it was scheduled."

"Okay..." Will said, nervously.

"See ya." Henry said, waving as he left.

"Yeah. Ditto." Will said, following his comrade.

Helen chuckled to herself as she closed the door.

"Two hours before the staff meeting?" John asked from the bed.

"Yes." She said with a grin.

"Did you have plans before then?"

"Yes, John, I did." She said as she walked back over to where he lay. "And all of them involve you and me."

"Helen, you have become devilish in your old age."

"Have I?" She asked with a raised eyebrow as she sat on the bed beside him and kissed him soundly.


	13. Cute

_Six weeks later_

-

"You two have always made me sick to my stomach." Tesla said as he walked past Helen and John again. "Especially now that you're making up for lost time."

They looked up from where they had been talking about the latest security updates to the Sanctuary, somewhat confused.

"How on Earth do we make you ill, Nicola?" Helen asked, looking at John with an amused smile flirting with the corners of her lips. "There is nothing romantic about looking at the schematics of the Sanctuary."

"Not when other people look at them." He said, pointedly. "But it's that which sickens me." He said, motioning to their closeness. "You made everything from cadavers to microscopic bacterial samples seem cute and cuddly when we were at Oxford."

Helen had to refrain from laughing at her friend. "I see."

"Well, Tesla, there is something to be said for falling in love and not merely in lust." John said with a shrug.

"Oh, and I suppose you two are the best example of that..."

"Well, it has been over a century since we first met.," Helen said, pointedly.

"And in that time, John lost his mind, slashed up a few prostitutes, you tried to kill each other, had a child, and now, you're back together." He said with annoying smugness. "Sounds like happily ever after to me."

Helen shook her head with a silent chuckle as she returned to her work.

"At least you're not like Will." He said, rolling his eyes with a theatrical shudder. "Or should I say Huggy Bear..."

Helen released an unexpected chortle before she covered her mouth, somewhat embarrassed by the outburst.

"And I suppose you've never been in love?" John said, looking up somewhat reluctantly from his work.

"As I told Will, I've been in love more than a few times, but I've always been smart enough to see it as the illusion that it is."

"Oh yes, that's why you've remained single for nearly four decades." Helen teased.

She could tell that John was trying not to just begin laughing at her implication.

"I'll have you know that I have been on a few dates in the last four decades." He rebutted without batting an eye.

She nodded, skeptically, and he shook his head. "That's not why I came."

"What can I help you with, Nicola?" She asked, looking up more professionally.

"You can tell that Kate person that I've noticed her eying me hungrily."

Helen's lips twitched as she tried to keep from laughing at him. He'd chosen the wrong string of words considering their earlier line of conversation.

"A twenty-something-year-old girl is eying a vampire who is over a century old, hungrily..." John asked, looking up somewhat matter-of-factly.

Tesla rolled his eyes. "I meant...that she would love to cut me up and sell me for parts."

"Ah." Helen said, sharing a look with John.

"Would you two stop acting like adolescents?" He demanded, brusquely.

"We'll try to control ourselves." Helen assured somewhat mockingly.

"This is useless." He said, shaking his head as he turned to leave. "By the way, we're out of wine."

"Again." John muttered, and Helen had to catch herself before another chuckle was released in earshot of the scientist.

A moment passed as they finally finished laughing before Helen looked back over at John considerably more seriously. "Will you excuse me, John?" She asked, gently touching his arm to attract his attention.

"Of course. Why? If I may ask."

She inhaled. "When he spoke of Kate, I realized that I have yet to apologize to her, and I feel that...if I am going to allow her to remain an active part of the Sanctuary, I should do so sooner rather than later."

"Would you like me to come with you?"

She shook her head. "No. I will be fine."

He leaned in and kissed her cheek. "For luck." He said tenderly.

"Thank you, John." She said with a small smile.

She took her leave of him, and walked toward Kate's personal quarters. With a gentle knock, she announced her presence outside the room.

Kate opened the door, dancing to the music she was hearing through her earphones. She looked up to see Helen waiting on the other side, and her face fell. She turned off the music and pulled the earphones from her ears. "What?"

"I came to see if you were available to visit with me for a few minutes." Helen said, mustering a smile.

"Uh...sure...why not?" She said, throwing the iPod onto the unmade bed.

Helen smiled somewhat nervously. "Perhaps we can visit over tea in my study?"

"I'm not a big tea gal..." Kate said, shaking her head.

"I can arrange for coffee if you would prefer."

"Look, what do you want?" Kate asked, looking at her reluctant benefactress.

Helen inhaled before she looked over at her newest member of her team. "I came to apologize."

"For what?"

"For my behavior when we first met."

"You mean the cruel and unusual punishment for a crime I didn't commit?"

Helen winced internally as she nodded. "Yes."

"It's okay." Kate said, shrugging.

"No, it's not "okay"." Helen said, quoting Kate. "I gave into my desperation, and I forgot that everyone has their own story."

"Look, you feel bad. I get it. You're not the wicked witch of the west. Whatever."

Helen bit her lip and looked over at Kate. "My daughter was a great deal like you." She said, softly. "And I was so determined to get her back that I was willing to do anything." She looked down in shame before she looked back at Kate. "I forgot that the only thing that separates me from the Cabal was their willingness to exploit any means at their disposal for the benefit of their project. And I offer you my most sincere apologies."

Kate reflected on her words for a moment before she nodded. "Thanks."

"Well, I should return to my study." Helen said, turning to leave.

"Hey, has that Tesla guy come and complained to you about me?"

Helen had to stifle an amused smile as she turned back. "Yes."

"I'm sorry. It's an occupational hazard."

Helen chuckled. "I've thought of selling him myself on more than one occasion."

Kate laughed as Helen walked back down the corridor.

"Especially when he has finished off my wine cellar for the second time in six months." She muttered to herself.


	14. Hyde and Seek

_A few days later_

_-_

Helen walked into Will's office where he was working on some paperwork. "Will, do you have a moment?"

He looked up to her before he nodded. "Yeah."

"I have something in my study which I am certain you'd be interested in seeing."

"Okay." He said, standing.

"This morning around five o'clock, I received a phone call from my contacts in the police department. They sent over some information about some interesting cases which have crossed their desks recently."

"What kinds of interesting cases?" He asked, confused.

"Violent murders where a man enters the home or place of business a few hours before the murders, but emerges from that home or place of business as an unidentified creature."

"Werewolf?"

She shook her head. "No. The creature is more ape-like than wolf-like."

"A costume? Halloween is around the corner."

She shook her head. "You'll see for yourself. Henry tapped into the city surveillance system and retrieved several videos of the areas and times of the murders."

He stood, looking over her shoulder as she pulled up the video on her computer.

A man, dressed in an expensive suit, walked into the small cafe. She fast-forwarded a few hours into the feed before the creature she'd described emerged, wearing the same suit, now ripped and bloody, as he left, looking around himself somewhat nervously.

She paused the video again. "This is what the authorities found." She said, retrieving a file of crime scene photographs.

Half a dozen eviscerated corpses littered the small one-room cafe. Blood was spewed over all the surfaces, and Will grimaced. "I hate to admit it, but even Jack the Ripper would be appalled by this mess."

Helen threw him a look.

"Sorry." He said, shaking his head. "I just...wow."

She stood, and retrieved a written report. "The autopsies of the bodies showed that many vital organs were absolutely destroyed."

"And you think this guy did it?"

"The police identified the man who entered the cafe as Dr. Henry Akers, a chemist who works for one of the pharmaceutical companies that previously worked for the Cabal."

"Okay..."

"He's the only one who was unaccounted for when the police examined the surveillance footage."

"So he, what? Morphed into a psychopathic ape and murdered six people?"

"Stranger things have been known to happen." She reminded him.

"Name one."

"How about the man who could fly because he wore a suit that was made of interwoven insects?"

"Okay, that was weirder." He admitted.

"My contacts inform me that this is only one of three such occurrences, and this man is the only link."

"So let's find him."

"Easier said than done." She said, seriously. "He hasn't been to work or his apartment in three weeks."

"Strange."

She nodded. "But our contacts outside of the police force have informed me that a man matching this description has been sighted in one of the alleys. I thought you might want to come with me, and see if we can persuade Dr. Akers to visit the Sanctuary."

"Persuade..."

"We'll bring tranquilizer guns and handguns as insurance that he comes along." She clarified.

"Ah." He said, nodding. "I'm in."

"Wonderful. We'll take the van." She said with a sober smile.

-

"This is so weird," Will began as they drove to the site. "Like Jekyll and Hyde."

"My friend, Robert, wrote that story." She said, trying to keep him from talking again about the similarities between the fictitious story and her former fiance.

"About you and Druitt?"

She sighed. So much for keeping her lover out of the comparison. "Actually, he claimed that it wasn't about John. It was about something he'd seen in 1885. I tried to track and capture it, but with such a young Sanctuary, it was a nearly impossible feat to find a man who morphed into an abnormal."

He nodded before Helen inhaled. "Still, as you suspected, Robert was one of the people who had alerted me to John's suspicious activity."

"Did you believe him when he said that this wasn't about you and John?"

"Until now?" She asked, looking over at Will. "No."

"You think he may have seen this abnormal?"

"It's possible." She admitted. "Especially if it's a case where a parasite inhabits a human host and takes control somehow."

"But would that account for the physical manifestation of its presence?"

She shrugged. "I would need to study the parasite and the host."

-

John walked out of Helen's study somewhat confused as Henry walked past. "Something I can do for you, Druitt?" He asked, looking over at him.

"Yes, actually." John said, seriously. "Do you know where Helen is? I haven't been able to find her all morning."

"Oh, yeah. She's on a mission."

"A mission?"

"Yeah. To find this Jekyll and Hyde abnormal thingy that she heard about."

"What?" He asked, surprised.

"Yeah. It's this guy who walks into a place like a normal guy, hangs around and then, BANG! He turns into this animal and slaughters everyone in the joint."

John's eyebrows raised in worry. "Where was she going?"

"I don't know." He said, shrugging.

John caught Henry by the collar and pressed him up against the wall. "Where was she going?" He demanded more loudly.

"I...I can look up the GPS on her phone!" Henry announced, nervously.

"Do it." He said, letting go of the him

"Yes, sir." He said, quickly inputting data on his tablet.

-

Helen stepped out of the van, pulling the tranquilizer gun from her belt. "Tranquilizers first, bullets last." She said, looking over at Will.

"Sure." He said, feeling a little nervous as they headed down the narrow alley.

Helen's eyes darted around the alley, waiting for some sound or indication that they were headed toward the abnormal they'd been looking for.

A moan met her ear, and she looked at Will. She pointed to her eyes as she indicated for him to watch her.

She followed the sound around the corner to where she found the man from the video lying on a pile of garbage. She hurried to his side. "Dr. Akers?"

He looked up, confused. "Excuse me?"

"Dr. Akers, I'm Helen Magnus." She introduced before the pungent scent of the rotting refuse, hot and wet from the ventilation of a nearby laundromat, caused her gag reflex to activate. She covered her mouth as she ran away from the offending smell, falling to her knees only a few moments later as she released the contents of her stomach.

"Magnus!" Will cried, hurrying over.

She wiped her mouth with a handkerchief as she shook her head. "I'll be fine." She assured. "Just..." She pointed back at Akers.

Will nodded. "Sure. Maybe I should call Kate. You should go home. Get some rest."

She shook her head, still recovering. "Just...talk..."

He nodded as he turned around.

"Uh, Magnus...he's gone."

She whirled around in surprise. She felt nauseous and dizzy as her equilibrium caught up to her body. She tried to stand, but faltered. Will caught her. "Magnus, you should go home."

"We need to find the abnormal." She said, leaning on him as John appeared before them.

"Helen! Are you all right?"

"Fine." She said, waving away his concern.

"No, she's not. She just vomited." Will reported. "And she's too weak to stand on her own."

"Thank you, Will." She said, looking over at him with a sigh. She looked back at John. "We lost Dr. Akers. We need to find him before he transforms again."

"Uh, Magnus..." Will said, looking up a few inches over John's head. "Too late."

Helen looked up to see the ape-like monster with wolf-like fangs and claws. She felt her head swim in dizziness and her knees weaken. John reached for her as she lost consciousness.


	15. Ill

The first sensation she felt was the warmth of her bed against the coldness of her skin. Her head was pounding, and she opened her eyes slowly.

"Helen." John greeted, looking over at her.

"John..." She whispered, trying to get up.

"Stay, Helen." He said, gently pressing on her shoulder. "You fainted when we saw the creature. I teleported you and Will back to the Sanctuary."

"You didn't capture him?" She demanded, forcing herself back up. "What if he kills again?"

"That was what I tried to prevent, Helen!" He cried in exasperation as he stood forcefully.

She slipped her legs out from underneath the covers as she prepared to get out of bed.

"Get back in bed, Helen. You're ill." He commanded. "You're lucky to be here in your personal quarters. Everyone else wants you in the infirmary or at a hospital."

"I'm fine." She assured.

"You don't look it." He said, seriously.

"Perhaps I am somewhat weary, but I will rest after we find Dr. Akers and help him." She said, trying to push past him.

He picked her up and returned her to the bed with little effort. "Rest, Helen, or I will call the doctor myself."

"What about Dr. Akers?" She asked, softly.

"Will and Kate are looking for him, but he's moved on from where he was." He said, sitting beside her on the bed.

"He seemed ill." She said, seriously.

"It would seem that his illness was contagious..."

"That's ridiculous." She said, shaking her head. "No illness incubates that quickly."

"Helen, please. Rest." He urged, gently.

She sighed as she rested her head against the pillow. "John, I am fine."

He touched her cheek gently. "You're not strong now, Helen. Please rest."

She bit the inside of her cheek. "For a few hours until I regain my strength."

"That's all I ask." He whispered as he leaned in and kissed her forehead.

She groaned as she rested the back of her head against the headboard. "I have not felt so ill since I carried Ashley." She admitted.

He touched her hand gently. "I wish I had been there to help you." He said, softly. "Raising a child on your own could not have been easy."

"It was not." She admitted. "But having Ashley in my life – for as brief a time as she was there – was worth it."

"I'm sorry we could not save her, Helen." He whispered, soberly.

She managed a sad smile as she saw the sincerity in his eyes. "So am I."

They sat in silence for a moment, each deep in thought at what their daughter had given them each.

Finally, John looked back at Helen. "What made you change your mind about leaving the embryo frozen?"

She bit her lip as she remembered those days.

-

"_Another job done," Bernie said with a grin. "Isn't it great?"_

"_Yes, Bernie. It was great." She whispered, thinking about the little boy they'd saved from the creature that now resided in the shoo._

"_Something on your mind?"_

She looked over with a small sigh. "Nothing." She said, shaking her head.

"_You sure?"_

"_I'm just thinking about little Will." She admitted._

"_Yeah, it's a shame about his mom."_

She swallowed as she nodded sadly. "Yes, it is."

"_Is he going to be okay, do you think?"_

"_I'll keep an eye on him." She said, seriously. "If something happens, I'll bring him here."_

"_You keep taking in wards like you were the state itself, Helen." He said, shaking his head. "First Henry, and now this boy if he gets into trouble...are you trying to make up for something in your past?"_

_She grimaced internally as she shook her head. "No, Bernie. I just like children."_

"_Hey, you know where my quarters are..." He said with a teasing smile._

_She rolled her eyes. "Please, Bernie. There are enough children in the world in need of a sanctuary."_

_He chuckled. "I know. Just giving you a hard time."_

_She remembered the child to whom she should have given birth, and she felt a yearning to feel the child within her once again._

_"__I'll see you at the staff meeting, okay?" Bernie asked, touching her shoulder._

_She nodded absently. "Of course, Bernie. Good night."_

_She didn't notice as he left the room. All she knew was that she had plans for the next few days. She was going to try to determine how to reimplant the embryo within her uterus, and what she was going to do when she tried to run the Sanctuary with a newborn infant depending on her._

-

"It was Will, actually." She admitted. "We received a call about an abnormal attack when he was six or eight years old."

"And?"

"His mother had been killed by the time we got there. We barely managed to save him."

"And this reminded you how?"

"It was something Bernie said." She said with a fond smile as she remembered her friend. "He said that I might as well declare myself a state with the number of wards I had taken in. And then, he wondered if I'd done something that I was trying to make up for."

"Like freezing Ashley's embryo."

She nodded. "Exactly. So I decided to come up with a plan, and...within a week, I was carrying Ashley again."

"Would you ever consider having another child?" He asked after a moment.

She looked deeply in to his eyes as she inhaled slowly. "I...I don't know." She admitted.

"I'm sorry. I should never have asked that." He said, shaking his head.

"John," she scolded gently. "You needn't apologize. The question was merely unexpected on my part, but not necessarily inappropriate on yours."

"I should simply leave you to rest, Helen."

"Please," she whispered as she caught his hand in her own. "Stay."

He studied her for a moment before he acquiesced. "If you insist."

"I remember one time when Ashley was ill." Helen said, reminiscently. "She had been infected with the _Varicella Herpes Zoster_ virus."

"What is that?" He asked, confused.

"A common virus which is highly contagious. It's usually spread through child communities. They call it chicken pox."

"Chicken pox?" He asked, raising an eyebrow.

She chuckled. "I know. It is a strange name for a disease."

He chuckled himself. "Go on..."

"Ashley could not stop scratching her spots, and so I put gloves on her hands and rubbed calamine lotion over her spots."

She felt tears wet her eyes, and she looked up at the ceiling as she tried to regain her composure.

"It's all right to cry, Helen." He reminded her. "She was your daughter."

Helen brushed away her tears as she looked back at him. "Yes, she was." She whispered. "And it hurts that she's not here."

He leaned in and hugged her, recognizing that she needed the tangible comfort of a warm embrace. As he held her, he vowed that he would never allow anything to hurt her as long as he could do something about it. No abnormal would lay a hand on her, and no psychopath would break her heart – he would remain sane for her until his dying day. He would be the strength that he knew she never wanted to admit she needed.


	16. Hunting

Helen entered Henry's office the next morning, feeling more rejuvenated and stronger than she had the night before.

"Henry, where do we stand on the location of Dr. Akers?"

"Doc!" Henry said, surprised.

"Were you expecting someone else?" She asked, curiously.

"Uh, yes...I mean, no...I mean..." He inhaled. "Dr. Akers?"

She nodded, somewhat amused. "Where is he?"

"We haven't found him yet."

"I see." She said, nodding thoughtfully. "Have we heard anything from our contacts?"

"No. No one knows where he is, but this came through the fax from the Police Department." He said as he offered the documents to her.

She examined them closely, feeling somewhat queasy again as she saw the carnage on the photographs. "He struck again last night. This time at a night club."

"Yeah. No survivors."

"He's getting bolder or less stable...depending on his condition..." She observed.

"Or both." Henry said with a shrug.

Helen sighed. She wished she'd refrained from getting ill. If she'd been as healthy as she'd believed, these people would not have died.

"Are you okay, Doc? You look a little pale."

"I'm fine." She assured. "I'll be better when we can help Dr. Akers. He did not look well when I met him in the alley last night."

"Druitt offered to help Will and Kate so that they could cover more ground."

"Keep me informed if they find Dr. Akers. I want to speak with him."

"Are you sure you should..." One look kept him from finishing his sentence. "You want to speak to Akers. Got it."

"Thank you."


	17. Fight

"Magnus," Henry called over the radio. "Will and Kate found Akers."

"Where?" She asked as she hurried out of the study.

"I'll send the coordinates to your phone."

"Thank you, Henry." She said, hurrying out the door.

Within a few minutes, she'd arrived at the alley as John teleported in. "Helen!" He cried in surprise. "What are you doing here?"

"Trying to speak to Dr. Akers." She said, hurrying to where the doctor lay, disoriented. "Dr. Akers, I'm Helen Magnus. We met briefly yesterday."

He looked at her in confusion for a moment before he turned back to the wall as a look of horror passed his features. "Leave me!" He commanded.

"Dr. Akers, we can help." She assured.

"No, it's already begun!" He cried, writhing in agony as his back stiffened and curved before their eyes.

Helen reached out a hand to examine him, but John pulled her back. "Helen, he's transforming."

She pulled her arm out of his grasp before he could return her to the Sanctuary. "All the more reason for us to assure that we can help."

"Dr. Akers, I can help." She said, reaching out to him again.

"LEAVE!" The sound was less human than the doctor's voice, and Helen pulled back somewhat worriedly.

With one final scream, he stopped moving, and Helen reached out again. "Dr. Akers?"

Will and Kate stood a few feet away, ready to shoot at the creature.

Helen pulled away somewhat hesitantly as the creature stirred.

"Dr. Akers, I can help you." She assured as she looked over. "I run an organization called the Sanctuary. We help people who wrestle with your dilemma every day."

The ape-like creature stood, and John pulled Helen back.

"Dr. Akers," she began, trying to reason with the creature.

She won a primordial roar as he bared his fangs in response.

A shot rang out, and the creature turned to look at Will. Another roar was their only reward as he walked toward his attacker.

Will's eyes widened in fear as John teleported over to the forensic psychologist and pulled him away from the fray.

Helen studied the creature. Only his chest area was soft enough for a bullet to penetrate, she realized quickly. The rest of him, though it seemed ape-like, was not the hardened leathery skin of an ape, but the armored plating of an armadillo. She had to restrain her curiosity and excitement about his peculiarity. She needed to get in a position so that she could take the shot or inform the others at the very least.

"Kate!" She cried. "A tranquilizer to the heart should bring him down!"

The bounty hunter nodded as she shot two tranquilizer darts into the monster's chest. John appeared beside Helen as she realized that the powerful tranquilizers had done nothing for the massive creature. "John! Kate!" She cried, looking over at him.

He nodded as he teleported over and saved Kate as the ape's clawed hands swiped at her leg.

While John was distracted, Helen reached for her own gun. Tranquilizers were no longer an option, she realized, and the creature was getting more and more aggravated. She ran toward the creature, shooting him once so that he would turn back to her.

Her wish came true, and the creature turned with his claws bared. Still, he was only half-turned, and she needed a better shot before he tried to injure her as he'd tried to hurt Kate.

How would she get him to turn the rest of the way? She asked, panicking slightly as she felt fear clutch at her heart.

"Helen!" John called from behind her.

The creature turned to face her entirely at the sound of the second voice, and Helen prepared to take her shot as the creature swung his claw in her direction.

It was as if time stood still, and Helen realized that if she was to complete her mission, she would probably be injured, or worse, killed. With a deep inhale, she cocked the gun, and aimed it.

Just then, a pink flash in front of her caught her by surprise, and she heard John's voice utter an unearthly cry of pain as he fell to the ground, bleeding from the injury he'd just sustained at the hands of the monster. John's collapse offered her the perfect shot, and in the shock of the moment, she took three shots with her hand gun. The literal Mr. Hyde released an primal groan as he fell back to the earth, having been shot in the heart.

She hurried to John's side, wishing that she and John had not been left alone. She reached for her radio. "Will!" She cried. "John's been hurt!"

"He only took me to the van. I'll be right there."

She put away the radio, and knelt down beside him. "John." She whispered as she studied him. She gagged on bile as she saw the severity of his injuries. Blood was everywhere as his severed carotid artery continued gushing blood with each beat of his weakening heart.

She propped his head on her lap, wrapping her left hand around the back of his neck so that she could press her hand against his neck to stop the rapid flow of blood. Her other hand reached into her pocket to retrieve her handkerchief. She placed one in her left hand to bandage John's neck loosely. "You're going to be all right." She whispered breathlessly. "Will's promised to get the van."

"Hel...en..." He choked out, struggling to look up at her.

"John." She whispered as her heart broke. "You're going to be fine." She assured. "We'll get you to the infirmary, and you'll be just fine. You always called me a miracle-worker after all."

Tears moistened her eyes as she realized he would probably die here in a dark alley, having protected her from the blood-thirsty monster.

"Hel...en...." He tried again, more urgently this time. "I...I..."

"Save your strength, John." She urged. "Will's going to be right back with the van. You will be fine."

He reached a hand up to her face in a gentle caress. "I...I love...you." He managed. "I...always...have."

She struggled to keep her composure as she saw his face slowly turn gray with the loss of blood. "I love you too, John." She whispered, her voice shaking with emotion.

A faint smile slipped onto his lips as he let his hand slip back down into her lap. His eyes took on a far-off look as his face lightened. "Ash...ley..." He managed.

Helen looked up to where he was looking with unshed tears pooling in her eyes. She half-expected to see their daughter standing above them in the air, but there was no earthly presence standing where he looked.

"She's...here." He managed, joyfully before he grimaced and coughed harshly as the blood in his throat choked him.

She looked back at him with sorrow etched in the lines on her face as she held him tightly in her arms. "Don't leave me." She begged. "Not now...not after everything we've been through to get here..."

He looked back at her with a look that belonged wholly to the man he'd been before he'd become the Ripper. "It's...all right...Helen..." He coughed again, and she tightened her grip on him as he spewed blood onto her shirt. "You'll...be all...right..." He assured, sinking back into her lap.

He felt cold and stiff in her arms. "Will!" She cried as rain fell from the heavens mingling with the tears on her cheeks. "Hurry!"

"Hel..." John said as he began to lose consciousness. "...en..."

"Don't do this, John." She cried as she lifted her hand to see if there was anything she could do to save his life right then and there.

"I'm...so...sor...ry..." He struggled as his strength waned quickly.

"Don't, John. You have nothing to be sorry for." She whispered. "Not now."

Already, the amount of pressure exerted by the blood flow on her hand was waning, and she knew that if there was any hope for his survival, she would need to give him a transfusion. Without the proper supplies, donor, or equipment, she couldn't do anything for him here. "Come on, Will." She whispered as she looked up at the street. "He saved you - now, save him." She pleaded.

Silence met her, and she looked down at John's lifeless body, willing him to gasp for breath as a sign that he hadn't just expired. "Please, John..." She begged.

She touched a trembling finger to his neck to feel for his pulse, but as she expected, it was gone.

"No." She whispered as she hugged his body close to her chest once more. "No!" She screamed to the heavens as her tears fell over the only man who'd ever held all of the pieces of her heart in his hand.

Her sobs were the only thing Will heard as he arrived with the van. "Magnus?" He asked, hurrying onto the scene.

She looked up at him in absolute misery. Her face, clothes, and hands were covered in a sticky mixture of her lover's blood, the rain falling from above, and her own tears.

"He's gone." She whispered thickly as reality set into the lines of her face.

He stared at her in shock as she looked back down at her lover's body, trying to keep the tears from spilling onto her cheeks in the agony of her loss.


	18. Aftershocks

Helen sat in her study, drinking a cup of tea as she contemplated the events of the past few hours with the numbness of shock.

"Magnus?" Will asked, knocking softly on the door.

She looked up. "Will." She said, managing a sad smile. "What can I do for you?"

"I actually came to see what I could do for you." He said, softly.

"I'll be all right." She said, forcing a smile to her lips.

"You've had a tough few months, Magnus, with Watson, Ashley, and then Druitt..." He said, seriously. "No one's going to blame you for having a little breakdown."

"I will be fine, Will." She said, more firmly as she took another sip of tea.

"At least tell me that a vacation is in your future."

She inhaled for a moment before she nodded. "Most likely."

They were silent for a moment before she looked over at him. "You kept telling me how much John was like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde."

"I was wrong." He said, somewhat embarrassed that he could have so grossly misread a person. Druitt had not been heartless; he'd given his life to protect the woman he'd professed to loving. "You were right. I didn't know what I was talking about."

She shook her head, numbly. "No. You were right. In many ways, his life paralleled that of Dr. Henry Jekyll."

"But?" He prompted.

"But in John's case, he found a happy ending."

"His life sounds like a tragedy to me." Will said, not understanding her logic.

"At the end of the novel, Will, Jekyll is unable to fight the monster." She informed him. "He commits suicide, having lost himself entirely to the monster."

"And Druitt..."

"Greater love hath no man than this," she quoted softly. "That a man lay down his life for his friends."

"John 15:13." He identified.

Tears welled up in her eyes. "No monster could do something so conscionable. And while John's life may have been a paradox to anyone who didn't understand his condition, in the end, Jekyll won out."

"I never thought about it that way." He admitted.

"You never knew him like I knew him." She said, wincing as she tried to restrain her tears. With another sip of tea, she tried return to a life of normalcy only three hours after she'd washed her lover's blood from her body.

Now she knew how Jacqueline Kennedy had felt after the assassination. _"It may sound strange, Helen, but ever since John's death, I haven't been able to feel truly clean. I'll always remember how it felt to have his blood on my dress."_

Likewise, Helen had showered three times since they'd returned home in an almost maniacal effort to wash the horror of his death from her memory as she scrubbed her body harshly.

"Well, if you need anything, let me know."

Helen's mind was pulled back to the present with his words, and she paused for a moment. She could easily wait a few weeks to ask him for the favor she had on her mind. Or a few months for that matter...

She swallowed somewhat nervously as she spoke. "Actually, there is something..."

"Yeah?" He asked,looking back at her.

"Will you please be prepared to head up the sanctuary for a period of time?"

"Sure. Why?"

She looked down at her teacup as the lump in her throat swelled again. "Because John has again left me with more than a broken heart."

He looked at her curiously before understanding dawned. "You're..."

She breathed in through her open mouth as she tried to withhold the tears. "Yes. I am carrying John Druitt's child again." She whispered. The tears were staying at bay so far. "I tested my blood after yesterday's episode. John didn't know it, but I had my suspicions. I checked the results after we returned today, and it was positive."

"Wow...another kid..."

She bit the inside of her lip as she looked down again, trying to keep control of her composure. "I know what you're going to say." She whispered. "That I'm a brave woman to go down this road again. After all, we all know how well everything turned out for Ashley." She managed before she broke down into sobs, crying for how violently she'd lost both her eldest daughter and her lover.

Will inhaled as he tried to find what to say to comfort her. Everything he could think of sounded so trivial when her heart had so clearly broken.

She finally looked up at him. "I suppose...in a way...that this is the only way he could keep from destroying my work." She whispered. "The only way he could swear to me that he would never return to his old ways, and keep his vow."

"I'm sure there was a way..." Will offered limply.

She shook her head. "No. He would have tried, but trying with the possibility of failure was never enough for John Druitt. He had to succeed." She swallowed down tears. "And...now, he has. He left this Earth the man that he had always wanted to be."

-

_There will be a second part to the story entitled "The Way Things Really Were". Hope you hop on over and look it up._


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